I’m going to come out and say it: if you’re buying a car because it has the most advanced software or assisted driving features or the biggest touch screen or the best wifi or whatever, you’re doing it wrong. To put it as delicately as possible, you’re being a drooling simpleton being bent over and brutally mistreated by pretty much every automaker. But don’t feel too bad, because it’s not entirely your fault; the whole way we approach tech in cars is kind of stupid, and we should rethink it all.
The fundamental problem is this: electronic technology advances far too rapidly to be something that gets permanently integrated into a car that you may want to own for more than, say, five years or so. There’s nothing that ages an otherwise perfectly-fine car more dramatically than integrated technology that was cutting-edge when the car was new.
Don’t believe me? Look at the center-stack display/infotainment system from this 2010 Maybach Zeppelin, a car that cost almost $500,000 when new:
(Photo: Maybach/Mercedes-Benz)
At the time, this was hot shit, the bleeding-edge of automotive tech at the time. Today, the crappiest Mitsubishi Mirage has a display with far better resolution than this gleaming chariot of the elite. And that was only 15 years ago; the lifespan of a car like a Maybach should be far, far longer than that! Is it not a precision engineered machine? Is it not an ultimate expression of driving comfort, luxury, and refinement?
And yet, when almost anyone gets into this thing, one of the first things they’ll notice is how embarrassingly backwards the tech inside is. That doesn’t seem fair, right? If we look at a Maybach from close to century ago, they don’t suffer from this issue. Look at the dash of this 1933 Maybach DS-8 Zeppelin:
(Photo: Bonham’s)
So what’s different here? It’s not like this car is free of technology; it is technology. But it’s a different sort of technology, and, more importantly, the intent of the technology is different.
(Photo: Bonham’s)
Of course, the dashboard here is full of dials and gauges; this car was extremely well-instrumented for its era. But the intent of all of this instrumentation wasn’t to showcase the absolute latest tech; it was just the application of the best available tools for the job. These are not the sorts of machines that change and advance dramatically. A good mechanical speedometer or tachometer or temperature gauge is still a good speedometer or tachometer or temperature gauge eight decades later. The fundamental technology hasn’t changed, and as a result, the instruments themselves can wear their age with pride, secure in their timelessness.
There’s a reason why absurdly expensive cars like the Bugatti Chiron decided against having any sort of center-stack screen:
(Photo: Bugatti)
Sure, I have my issues with cars like these Bugattis, but I do think they understood this fundamental concept: technology can date a car deeply. And rarely well.
There are some exceptions to this rule: some kinds of extremely-advanced tech can age well, or at least interestingly, not from a perspective of usability, but from a novelty perspective. This really only works if something is among the first of its kind, like the CRT touchscreens in 1980s Buicks:
(Photo: GM)
…or perhaps the CRT dashboard instruments of the Aston Martin Lagonda:
What these systems have in common is interesting hardware that was way ahead of its time. Neither would be great in a daily driver perspective, but from a historical interest perspective, they’re fascinating. If they work. Which, especially in the case of the Lagonda, is wildly unlikely.
Now, I’m no luddite. I’m under no illusion that we should be banning modern digital tech in cars, because that would be idiotic, and no one wants that. But what I am suggesting is that all modern tech in cars, anything that is likely to rapidly advance over the years, needs to be easily and readily replaceable, because the whole experience of an otherwise great car can be ruined by outdated technology that just taints everything.
And that means we need industry-wide standards. We had them once – the DIN and double-DIN standards for head units was once very effective, and there was – and still is – a thriving aftermarket for new head units that can quite easily bring old cars into modernity with greater ease than new ones.
For example, you can upgrade a 2002 Toyota Corolla to have modern tech with the latest version of Apple CarPlay or Android Auto far cheaper and easier than you can, say, a 2022 Toyota Prius Prime. Here’s a double-din unit that’ll drop into a Corolla for about $200, giving the car the ability to interface with a standard and devices that weren’t even introduced to the world, in their earliest forms, for a solid five years after the car was sold.
If you wanted to upgrade your 2022 Prius, if you had one that, say, didn’t have CarPlay or Android Auto, you can either tack on a clunky extra screen to just give you that, or you could find a used OEM entire center stack for about $1,600 and replace the whole middle of your dash. There’s no upgraded versions for new tech, this is just the optional stock one from Toyota.
Here’s what I think should happen, in an ideal world: all the major carmakers would agree on a set of car tech standards, ones that define both physical dimensions and connector standards. If carmakers want to have HVAC controls on screens or other functionality, no matter how insipid, they need to agree on standards to control those.
If you spend a crapload of money on a car you really like, it’s ridiculous that it should be stuck with rapidly-aging display and infotainment hardware. At some point fairly quickly into your car’s life, your phone, which many people upgrade every few years, will significantly eclipse your car, technology-wise.
This is not always something that can be fixed with exciting OTA software updates; sometimes you need new display and computing hardware. Remember how Tesla had to upgrade the internal computers in many customers’ cars so they could run the latest versions of their FSD driver-assist software? This could have been made vastly easier if these cars adhered to some sort of car-tech standards that were designed for easy upgradability.
I realize there will be some sacrifices in design and packaging if everything must meet universal standards of some sort. Also, I don’t care. It’s not like any carmaker has made such fascinating center-stack display designs that the world will be impoverished for their loss. I would much rather be able to have a crapton of options to replace the clunky old system in my otherwise-fine car with something new.
Of course, carmakers will not like this idea at all; they’re generally loath to standards of any sort, and technically, it’s not a trivial task: there needs to be connector standards, we need to know what signals and inputs can be read, from cameras to temperature sensors to radar units. Then there’s outputs, like being able to control servo motors for vent direction (if so equipped) or fan speed or other hardware. There’s a lot!
Here’s the overall point, though: standards are good! A thriving aftermarket is good! We shouldn’t let what we had in the rapidly-declining DIN/Double-DIN standard days go away. It’s madness that we spend so much money on a car and find ourselves locked into the tech that was current when the car was new.
It’d be like buying a house with a built-in television and game console, and that’s just what you’re stuck with as long as you own the house. Would you want that? Stuck playing your Sega Master System on a 15″ Sony Trinitron in 2025? I mean, I have a basement full of old Ataris and similar archaic stuff, but that’s by choice.
We deserve better from our cars. I just wish I knew how to make this happen.
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It is a very valid design issue, but I wouldn’t worry about the screen/AV systems being upgraded. Most cars built now will be around long enough for many people to care. The fact is that because car makers care less and less about their product’s value in the used market, they don’t even bother supporting replacement parts for very long. Car makers only care about selling new cars, and the result is designs that are top-to-bottom built to be disposable.
The solution for the screen thing right now is easy. Make it a screen that can mirror a phone and run a simple app for the car. Leave the controls for vital systems as knobs and switches, like the good lord and every ergonomic study ever done intended. The car makers can also have the app useable on the phone if they must.
I fell victim to this problem with my 2014 328 BMW. It came with a NAV system that featured real time traffic updates. When the cell phone providers switched from analog to digital, I lost the traffic updates. It had been a wonderful feature. No easy remedy even if willing to pay. Too bad because I generally like the car notwithstanding the ticking time bomb plastic chain guide.
Not especially related but that ET image made me think of a guy who managed to run a recent Idolm@ster smartphone game on his wrx center console. This is a game that lets my phone act as a Hothands pouch from the strain so whatever subaru is doing, good on them
Regulation is the only thing that could make this happen, and when cars get more regulated, they get more expensive. Most car makers want the car to feel dated in a few years so you buy a new one. I am convinced it is is not a oversite, it is an intentional decision to build in obsolescence.
I believe that it isn’t quite that, but not far off. They truly don’t care what happens once the warranty runs out and focus purely on what things sell for the most money. The disposable designs are the natural product of that set of priorities more than a proper plan for obsolescence.
Hah. This is about as likely as toaster manufacturers and bread makers getting on some kind of conference call and having a discussion about shapes fitting together.
Look at all those buttons in the Maybach! Oh, how I want to press them. Look! It even has a SERV button! Please tell me that opens the glovebox liquor cabinet.
I have a couple of ideas.
Vehicles that tack their touchscreens on the dash like a tablet, why not make that an actually detachable, replaceable tablet-like component? The processor can be bundled in, and software interfaces with common vehicle components (HVAC, lights, seat controls, etc. as well as OBD/motor control/BMS, etc.) can be standardized. You could potentially even use this processor to drive a digital dashboard as a second screen. Car interface feeling sluggish, dated? For, say, $1k you can buy a new one, plug it in and go.
It’s likely not feasible to upgrade the displays on cars that have massive, built-in displays stretching across the dashboard. For those, make the guts powering them replaceable. Create a swappable daughterboard containing the processor, GPU, and storage that plugs into the car using a standard interface. You’d have a new OS, a new interface, maybe even new features running on snapper hardware for low four figures.
I’d also advocate for manufacturers to either licence their software for older interfaces to 3rd parties or even open-source them after, say, 25 years. GM might not want to keep supporting human interfaces for old cars but I have no doubt there’ll be communities of enthusiasts for even seemingly pedestrian models who’d love to maintain their vehicles’ functionality by building their own updates.
Love this idea, complete it with a case to keep it in when you remove it from the car when you leave – Just like the old-school faceplates.
I think there’s an easy solution, but it won’t happen. It makes too much sense.
I agree with you – and I wrote the following comment before even reading your entire post, which I then went back and read and saw that we had the same thing in mind.
Standardize the wiring harness that connects to the car’s Infotainment/Nav/Control/Whatever systems. Make the unit that houses the embedded screen a standard size (I hate the “velcro’d on or pop-up look). Remember how easy it was to buy aftermarket “head units?” You might need a plate with a standard sized opening, but that was it.
Sellers of these systems could make them more Android Auto, Apple Car Play or whatever-focused. It would’n’t matter, because you could still ask your car to turn up your living room thermostat from 60 miles away through google or siri, and it would tell you it did through regular-old speaker wire through OEM or upgraded speakers.
Standardize the OS’s to work with commands for your car to change from Snow mode to Mall Crawl mode or whatever.
It’s not that hard.
“To put it as delicately as possible, you’re being a drooling simpleton being bent over and brutally mistreated by pretty much every automaker.”
I can’t help but imagine Jason typing this while being piloted by a tiny version of Adrian hiding underneath his tall chef’s hat.
That’s about as delicate as a freight train lol.
I would go see Ratatorchie on opening night, which I never do. 🙂
It depends on what you care about in a car.
Can you imagine if all the basic controls were as weird and varied as infotainment screen controls? It would be like brass age cars, only wackier. ‘The 2026 Lessus PVX features innovative foot-based steering, which is more natural to walking, and keeps your hands free.’
I’d say the ironic part of this is that particularly *bad* touch screen interfaces (be it because they were outdated when new or had quality control problems) of the 2010s are more likely to skate this being a problem then ones that are alright and decently reliable for the time.
GM infecting their entire Cadillac lineup with CUE has made that interface have a healthy lineup for replacement parts for the entire thing, for example.
I had a 1992 Lexus SC300 as my daily 7-8 years ago. Sent the factory head unit out to a 3rd party that added a pigtail with an aux in so I could use my phone for music with the stock system.
Its pretty easy to do if you are handy with a solidering gun and can read a wiring diagram, but Im not that talented. Basically on my car they unsoidered the input from the tape deck and sodiered in the pigtail with the aux in. Rigged the tape deck to turn “on” when you inserted a tape, I think they disconnected all the physical tape drive crap, just to where if a tape was inserted it would take input off that aux in pigtail. You could also have them wire in an aux in where your cd changer connects, but I have a ton of CDs and loved that trunk mounted 12 disc changer.
Pretty slick solution for a car like that SC where an aftermarket head unit would RUIN the look of the dash. Also helps that the factory stuff was pretty damn good out of the box on that car.
My girlfriend’s brother used to modify the tape decks in cars to accept an iPod, so you’d just stick one in like a tape, and it would plug into a 30-pin connector and you’d use a little remote to control it.
This has been the way for a long time and is yet another system to go this way. Those guys at Edison motors really do a good job of going though all of it. I remember my dad yelling about the late 80s cars with proprietary headlights instead of the standard sealed beams. 3rd party part suppliers and the Internet has made it less painful.
I have a feeling the aftermarket will come though. This has been the way for years with VW head units and those suppliers have solutions for other OEMs.
I would imagine as more sensor suites are added and Ethernet is implemented instead of can buses this more aftermarket solutions will be available for adas. There are already a few.
The after maker has already developed standalone MCU for Tesla drive trains for Tesla swaps.
It would be great if there were standardized hardware along with the now increasing software defined car. I think its starting to happen on bev platforms but it’s still massive road to go towards standardization.
Exploring aliexpress is pretty fun- what you may not know is that there are quite a few chinese manufacturers making OEM conformal head units that support Carplay and Android Auto. They’re like $80.
BMW in general got in good with Apple and the 2009+ CIC head units have a 1280×480 resolution that is explicitly supported by Carplay (and therefor Android Auto), and because BMW has the display as a separate component from the brains- you can get a box that intercepts the video and idrive controller and have an OEM like experience except you have wireless CP/AA. You can even plug into MOST and have digital sound.
Similar retrofits exist for most COMAND head units from mercedes and lots of automakers. It’s not perfect but goes a long way.
2010s Jaguars all have a couple variations that basically can handle everything (including TPMS!) except the useless valet mode functions.
I’ve just installed an Apple Carplay/Android Auto display in my Dad’s 2006 BMW E61 and it’s fantastic.
His car has the CCC system, and the display randomly died a while back. This new, upgraded display cost less than a direct replacement for the original.
All the original functions and menus work just as they always did, but it now has wireless CP/AA with a high resolution touch screen.
I really wish other manufacturers had a similar setup.
Jason is right.
I remember being so impressed with the nav system on my Acura 3.2TL when I bought it new in 2000. Ten years later, Honda stopped offering updates … and now it looks positively N64 next to the CarPlay unit I had installed a couple of years ago.
This dawned on all of us when google maps became widely available on phones circa 2007. All of a sudden your phone was a better nav system than built in head units that cost a very pretty penny to spec. But the general public’s inertia is not to be underestimated: i think there’s still the odd rental car co that offers “GPS” for a fee, and I have acquaintances who were confused not too long ago when I was telling them to just use their phones and not the shitty, laggy 3” built in “nav” they paid lots for in their brand new Volvo.
So between planned obsolescence and dangling shiny new things in front of buyers, sadly this may never be right again.
I love the Rivians and I am worried about their future overall functionality when digital tech is all so baked into the car.
The idea that you can tether your phone to the vehicle and have it take over the center screen was a great idea.
Or just mount it to the dash somewhere, not as elegant but perfectly fine from a functional standpoint.
Unfortunately, there are 2 “standards” here that have to be supported. Plus, the singular companies behind these standards can collect data that can be monetized.
So now automakers want a piece of that pie and can use the excuse that they want to take back styling control of their center consoles. After all they want to be “delighting customers” or whatever nonsense UI designers are spouting these days to mean “we don’t work for you, you work for us”.
Yes, and like increasingly many less-than-ideal things in our life these days, you can eventually point a finger at Silicon Valley. And the problem is just accelerating. Big topic, and not a luddite by far, but boy I’m getting fed up.
Well, there is a pretty good solution to this problem, and quite a few automakers are already using it, although almost exclusively for lower-end cars, except for Ferrari, I think. There are a couple of Citroëns, Dacias, and Fiats, etc., where the base-level version of the car doesn’t have a center screen, just a place where you can place your phone.
Here’s the genius thing about this: You need to download an app that will serve as the main screen after you connect your phone to the car. It allows you to access car HVAC and other utilities and use it as the entertainment and navigation screen. It’s the best solution ever. Your screen will always be up to date with the latest screen tech, and your UI will always be up to date and will never look outdated, as long as there’s someone out there to make an update for your “car app.”
Right with you on this one, especially for cheaper cars: just do away with proprietary infotainment and put a phone/tablet cradle at the top of the central console. Ideally these things would be adjustable in width and have a usb-c plug with height adjustment, allowing for a snug fit of most phones/tablets, as well as charging, and tapping into the integrated amp/physical controls (volume, track skip, mute, take/decline phone call, etc). The fact that this isn’t more prevalent almost 20 years into the smartphone revolution makes me think that sometimes carmakers aren’t serious about cutting costs, almost as if they’d rather spend a bit more per unit if it means adding some planned obsolescence to it.
My mother Fiat Panda ( the modern version of the Panda, not the 1980s original one ) has that phone holder…
But it’s just that : a phone holder, there’s no app to download to control things in the car… everything ( radio, heating/cooling ) is done by good old tangible buttons you press or turn.
I also miss the time of the DIN slot in cars. ( even if I don’t own a car anymore )
Well I miss the time when the only electronic in a car was concentrated in the thing you put in that DIN slot. At that time you din’t require a Bsc in computer science and some serious equipment to troubleshoot your car… you only needed spanners, screwdrivers and a few other basic tools to perform most of the stuff… and a few more specialized mechanical tools to perform the rest.
Until your phone dies and you can’t change the HVAC temperature. Or they decide to stop updating the app for newer versions of IOS or Android. Manufacturers aren’t going to release specs/API for 3rd party apps or update the app any longer than they’re required to.
I definitely like the idea of having a separate phone-based UI for infotainment and navigation, but there’s pitfalls there too.
Yeah, but here’s where the aftermarket comes into the picture. If a car maker stops updating their apps, the aftermarket would take over and provide a proper alternative. The financial side of this could vary, ranging from a one-time purchase to a subscription or the usual “we own your data and you get our app for ‘free'” nonsense.
And look, from the carmaker’s point of view, there’s not much of a hurdle either. The only physical standard here is USB-C, which is now in every phone. With that, you have data transfer and it also charges your phone, so it won’t die on you. I don’t get why carmakers aren’t pushing in this direction altogether. Instead, they’re forcing us to use 15-16 inch or even larger screens with some half-baked operating systems that will never be good enough.
I think most people who own a modern car with CarPlay or Android Auto are only using the center screen as a secondary monitor for their phones. I certainly do that. I don’t even know what my original car UI looks like because, before I even start the car, my phone is already connected and takes over the center screen. It’s absolutely silly and really unnecessary to have that screen there
Go back to single-din, double-din center consoles. That was the golden era of upgradable radios. Hell, you can still find up to date Android Auto, Apple CarPlay double din units today.
It really sucks that we’ve had this standardized for so long, and let it slip away just because automakers dangled some shiny touchscreens in front of our faces. But to be fair, single/double din stopped making sense in recent years due to miniaturization of tech, so you no longer need an actual hole in the dash, just something that keeps your screen of choice held in place in the central console.
I remember it going away long before we all had smartphones. I remember seeing the radio and HVAC controls in the ovoid Tuarus and thinking it would be impossible to upgrade the stereo. Aftermarket eventually found a way but it was quite inelegant.
Yeah, automakers definitely started to move away from the standard way before touchscreens became omnipresent, but it feels like cheap touchscreens were the final blow.